


and every pond (nameless now)

by Anonymous



Category: La casa de papel | Money Heist (TV)
Genre: Angst, Arguing, Bittersweet, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Terminal Illnesses
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-06
Updated: 2020-09-06
Packaged: 2021-03-06 17:08:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,636
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26312401
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: It's raining, when Andrés asks the question that will haunt Martín for decades to come.
Relationships: Berlin | Andrés de Fonollosa/Palermo | Martín Berrote
Comments: 14
Kudos: 54
Collections: Anonymous





	and every pond (nameless now)

**Author's Note:**

> warnings for terminal illnesses, implied child abuse (minor), arguing, vomit and blood mention (minor), weight loss mentions, medication use and major character death

Martín doesn't like going to bed angry at Andrés. He doesn't like sleeping without resolving a fight.

Andrés tells him it's stupid. "When you're sleepy, you're grumpy, mi amor," Andrés says, "so many of our fights would be non-existent if you just went to bed on time."

Sometimes, Andrés says something along those lines during fights too, without that fondness in his voice that Martín is so used to, and it always makes Martín see red.

The same sentence, said on a lazy day with fondness, makes his heart flutter pleasantly.

Andrés is right, too, Martín knows. He does get grumpy when he is tired. Still, he doesn't like to go to bed angry at Andrés.

And no matter how stupid Andrés thinks it is, he never slams the door behind himself in his bedroom and lay down; sometimes eyelids heavy and gaze blank, he still stays up with Martín, until they resolve the issue, until Martín can go to sleep peacefully in Andrés' arms.

It's raining, when Andrés asks the question that will haunt Martín for decades to come.

"Will you ever forgive me, I wonder," Andrés says, thinking out loud, but it's also a question at the same time.

Martín is halfway on top of Andrés, their bodies tangled together, his ear right against Andrés' heart, as if to remind himself every second that it's beating.

Andrés' hand in his hair doesn’t stop caressing, even though Martín freezes. He opens his eyes, and swallows.

"Of course I will," he says. "I would never blame you in the first place."

Andrés sighs. "It's selfish of me, to do this."

Martín blinks and blinks and his eyelashes are wet.

"I never want to hurt you, but I will, Martín," Andrés says. "I don't know how to live with that."

Martín doesn't either. He doesn't know how to live with any of this, because it feels too fragile, too weak, though he has never loved anyone as strongly as he loves Andrés, it feels as if they are hanging together by a thin thread that can snap any moment.

"If you're selfish, so am I," Martín replies. Closes his eyes and wills himself to breathe. "For hurting you like this."

It makes Andrés laugh, short and sweet.

They are both hurting each other, constantly, without any meaning behind it because they don't mean to do it, because the only reason they hurt is because they love, and they love because they are human.

Martín doesn't want to stop being human.

He doesn't want it to stop hurting, then. He reaches and grabs Andrés' unoccupied hand in his own, and squeezes tight enough to hurt.

It's a promise without any words.

*

Andrés likes to go to the beach and lay down on the sand. The sand is never too hot, which means the ocean is too cold most of the times.

Andrés likes it. He doesn't want to swim. He wants to sit down on the sand and watch the sun go down behind the ocean, disappear into it until the sky is dark and velvet, and then he likes to lay down, watch the stars if they are there.

Sometimes there are no stars, and Andrés stares at the pitch black sky without any emotion in his eyes.

Martín plops down next to him and talks until Andrés starts replying, talks until Andrés laughs or chuckles or some days just smiles tiredly.

Martín has been talking a lot lately. His throat always ends up sore.

*

"Do you believe in heaven?" Andrés asks.

They are having breakfast, the sun hanging in the sky, big and bright.

Martín finds it hard to swallow a lot of a sudden. The food he just ate tastes like bile in his throat.

"It's complicated," he replies.

Andrés puts his fork down. "Uncomplicate it," he says. "We have all the time in the world."

Sometimes Andrés says shit like that and Martín has to force down the anger inside of him.

Remind himself he isn't angry at Andrés, just angry at the world.

Remind himself that Andrés should be able to joke about this, deserves to joke about this, because there is nothing else he can do except joke about it, or maybe cry, but Martín knows how much Andrés hates crying, a childhood habit.

He wipes his mouth with a napkin. He is never this politely, normally. Right then, he is trying to stall.

"I want to believe that there is a place we go after we die, where everything is good, and we get to see our loved ones again," he says. The lump in his throat is like a boulder.

Andrés hums. "I feel like there's a _but_ at the end of that sentence," he says.

"But." Martín smiles. Has to look away. "It sounds too good to be true."

He doesn't ask Andrés if he believes in heaven. He doesn't know if he can stomach the answer, he already feels like throwing up.

He goes to take a shower and clutches his empty stomach until he feels like he can breathe again.

*

"Andrés," Martín says. "Let's just go to bed and forget about this."

He has a headache and his eyes are burning from being open for so long. He just wants this fight to end, it's one of the long ones, has been going on for too long.

And Andrés sounds too out of breath.

Martín is getting used to seeing Andrés like that, breaths a little wheezy, hands a little uncertain as he holds on the wall to avoid a fall.

He hates how he's getting used to it. It used to alarm him, seeing Andrés like that. Now, it's just something they live with, though it hurts both of them each time it happens.

"I'll take the couch," he says. Andrés should be in no shape to argue--he really isn't, actually, but he does anyway.

"No," Andrés says. His voice is hoarse.

His lungs are failing him, day by day, a constant dying that will never stop until he gives his last breath.

Everyone is dying a little bit every day, Martín tells himself, but it's not the same, the way he is dying, and the way Andrés is dying, painful with every breath.

"What happened to not going to bed angry?" Andrés asks.

Martín laughs humorlessly. "You really think you can handle an argument right now, Andrés?" He asks, voice a little too cruel. "You can barely stand up--"

He cuts himself off, like a blade cuts through skin, painful and fast.

It feels like blood is pouring from the cut, liters of it, as Andrés cocks his head to the side, and smiles.

"Which is why we shouldn't go to bed until we resolve this," Andrés says.

Martín feels dizzy all of a sudden. Has to tell himself to breathe around the pain but it hurts too much, like someone has gripped his heart and is squeezing with all their might.

"Andrés," he starts, doesn't know what else to say.

It all seems so stupid, then. Martín tries to think but can't even remember what they were arguing about.

It's Andrés who says it first. "I'm sorry."

Martín is still battling for a breath that doesn't hurt like a stab wound.

He inhales too sharply, his eyes wet with tears he doesn't let fall. "I'm sorry too," he says, "I'm sorry, Andrés, I--I'm sorry--"

He wants to crash into Andrés like a car, make them both go tumbling to the ground with the force of his hug, and he would have done it, a few years back, a few months back, but now he can't.

He hugs Andrés like he is handling something delicate, and he is, in a way.

Andrés hugs him back just as gently.

Then, Martín thinks maybe his dying is similar to Andrés after all, because though not in the same way, every breath he takes hurts too, hurts so much that he wants to just give up and hold his breath as long as he can, until he doesn’t need to breathe at all.

*

As they get closer to it, the inevitable end, things get sharper, so tense that every edge feels like it can cut any second.

Martín knows it's because Andrés is hurting, and Martín is hurting too, and when they are hurt, they lash out, like animals, as humans do.

It happens at dinner, Andrés' hands shaking so much that he can barely hold his spoon.

Martín lets him be for a while, until he can't handle it.

"Do you want help?" He asks, and only realizes what he did when Andrés looks at him sharply.

See, Andrés isn't a foolish man. He is aware he is dying, on death's doorstep, basically. He is aware that he can barely get from one place to another without running out of breath.

He is aware he can't hold that spoon and eat his dinner by himself with his hands shaking like that.

He is still too prideful to accept the help Martín is so ready to give.

Martín almost flinches when Andrés gets up, though the movement is not sudden by any means.

"I'm not very hungry," Andrés says. It might as well be the truth, considering the countless medications he takes to bargain one more breath.

They always kill his appetite, and he has lost a lot of weight, not just from battling his illness, but also the meds making him too nauseous to eat sometimes, even though he feels up to it, energetic enough to eat like it's such a hard activity.

Andrés leaves, and Martín considers following but he is frozen on the spot.

He wonders if this will turn into one of those long nights where they argue for hours, until Andrés looks about ready to collapse, and Martín keeps wondering if Andrés will die right then and there, and Martín keeps wondering what he will do if Andrés dies angry at Martín, how will he ever sleep again--

That doesn't happen. Andrés joins him on the couch, an hour or two later. Martín looks at the curve of his nose, the sharpness of his cheekbones now only more prominent because of the weight loss.

"I don't want you to have to take care of me," Andrés says.

Martín moves on the couch until he is right by Andrés' side, their shoulders brushing. He lays his head gently on Andrés' shoulder, crosses his arms over his chest. "Why?" He asks.

"Is this the life you wanted, when you joined me after the bank?"

Martín almost laughs. He doesn't. "No," he says simply. Andrés is tense beside him. "I never wanted to see you sick, I never wanted to watch you die, I didn't want it to be like this at all."

And it's the truth and Andrés can tell as Andrés can always tell with Martín.

"Andrés," Martín says. Raises his head and turns, waits until Andrés turns too so they are looking into each other's eyes. "I will take any life, any life at all, if it's a life by your side. And any life where I don't have you, no matter what, is not a life worth living."

Andrés hates crying, he is a creature of nature, much capable of adapting, and crying used to be dangerous, so from a young age Andrés learned to never cry, but in that moment, when his eyes fill with tears, Andrés doesn't look away. It's a sign of trust.

Andrés trusts Martín with his tears, as he does with his life.

Martín reaches forward and lays a hand on Andrés' cheek, the man instantly leaning into it.

As his eyelashes flutter and his eyelids fall shut, a rebellious tear makes its way up and down the mountain of his cheekbones, and Martín watches without a breath in his lungs.

"I wish a softer ending was possible for us," he says, quiet into the calm air. "But I appreciate any ending at all, as long as my story involves you."

*

They watch the sunrise and the sunset in the same day, the same breath.

They make love and roll on the bed lazily afterwards.

They drink tea from the same chipped mug, steal bacon from each other's plates.

They walk hand in hand not because Andrés is too weak to walk on his own but just because they can.

Every minute they spend together, Martín knows he will cherish forever, for how long the rest of his life without Andrés will be.

One day, he will miss Andrés, he knows.

Miss the man so much, so strongly, that life will not feel worth living after all, that nothing will feel worth it.

He knows he will look at a tree and see Andrés' posture, look at a cup of coffee and see Andrés' eyes, look at the sky and try desperately to feel the man staring down at him but feel nothing at all--

They go to the fair and eat cotton candy together. They share one, of course, as they are completely cliché. It's sticky, and Martín somehow gets some in his hair. Andrés complains about the texture against his fingers, how they feel dirty. Makes a disgusted face when Martín offers to lick them clean.

And they are happy.

They are happy, they are happy, and Martín knows it won't last, it will end way too soon--

But it should be enough, to be as happy as you can, as long as you can.

They are happy, and Martín wants to remember that and only that after Andrés is gone.

That they were happy, so incredibly happy, no matter what.

*

They are out of coffee, and Martín wants to bang his head against the wall in frustration.

It's way too early to deal with no coffee, but he sighs dramatically, and tells himself to man up.

He gets dressed, and writes a little note, went to get coffee, with a smile and a heart next to it.

He puts it on the nightstand and allows himself to watch Andrés breathe for a few seconds, the sunlight coming through the window in rays hitting his body but not his face, not his eyes, as if nature itself is trying to not to disturb the man's sleep.

He watches Andrés' chest rise and fall steadily. Andrés has been getting tired so much quicker, sleeping a lot more, compared to before.

Martín doesn't mind it. He is even learning to sketch, a little bit, sketching Andrés' sleeping figure every morning.

It's a boring and normal morning, nothing amiss, except that they are out of coffee, and that is a problem solved easily enough, takes maybe half an hour, since the grocery store is too far, and Martín lingers a little, just breathing in the early morning air.

He returns home and he prepares breakfast. Drinks a cup of coffee, puts the kettle on to make another one, and goes to wake Andrés.

He leans against the doorway, and smiles. "Andrés," he says.

Andrés used to be a light sleeper, but it takes more to wake him now. Martín doesn't mind. "Andrés," he says dragging the name out, knowing how much Andrés hates it when he does that, burying his head into the pillows with a groan. "Andrés," Martín singsongs.

Andrés doesn't reply. The sun is hitting his face now, unashamed, but Andrés doesn't look bothered by it. 

Martín's eyes fall to Andrés' chest again. He counts. One breath, two breaths, three breaths.

Martín counts again. One breath, two breaths, three breaths.

His own chest rising up and down with each one, as he counts and counts, trying to keep his breathing under control.

Andrés' chest is still, and stays still, and never moves again.

fin.

**Author's Note:**

> hope u enjoyed and pls tell me if i forgot to tag smth <3


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